The Story of Phaedra and Hippolytus

Chasitity lead to Despair 

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In both accounts, chastity is the moral that is question. Hippolytus being chaste is somewhat to blame, as it is not ‘normal’ for a male to be chaste, with it being a more ‘feminine’ trait. However, it is more likely that the tale is telling of the ‘evil’ that are women and the harm their lies and feelings cause the normal lives of men.

Both Hippolytus and Theseus are changed after Phaedra both makes her request and makes her lies. This is also seen with Pandora, women making mistakes through their own nature and men reaping the disasters that follow.

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The Vexed Woman, Again

In an alternate account, Phaedra hangs herself after being refused, leaving a suicide note for her husband to find. In the note she accuses Hippolytus of trying to lie with her. With this, Theseus calls upon Poseidon to grant him one of three curses he was promised to kill Hippolytus. Theseus banishes him from the land to die either by the curse or by exile on foreign land.

Some time later Hippolytus was killed by his own chariot, as Poseidon sent a huge bull to rise from the sea, which confused and frightened the horses. The chariot was thrown and destroyed, with Hippolytus becoming tangled in the reins and being dragged by the horses until he died.

After Theseus is told of his son’s demise, Phaedra’s falseness is exposed and the truth is revealed to Theseus.

(Euripides, Hippolytus)

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The Chaste Man

Since Hippolytus had his life ended due to his chastity, received honours equal to those offered to the gods by his people, the Troezenians.

(Diod 4.62.4)

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The Vexed Woman

Being refused, Phaedra returned to her husband, Theseus, and told him that Hippolytus had proposed lying with her! With this, Theseus summoned Hippolytus to question him, as he doubted his wife’s accusations.

When Phaedra learnt of the questioning, she feared the result, and so hung herself.

When Hippolytus heard the accusation, he was driving a chariot and was so distraught that the horses escaped his control and ran away with him. The chariot was smashed to bits and Hippolytus was tangled in the leather thongs and so was dragged by the horses until he died.

(Diod 4.62.3)

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The Request, and Refusal

When Phaedra next met Hippolytus, she asked him to lie with her after and was spurned! Hippolytus refused to lie with his step-mother, according to Euripides because he was a chaste man who shunned the bed of love and marriage. (Eur. Hipp. 1) Euripides also accounts the love that Phaedra has for Hippolytus to a curse that Aphrodite has placed upon her.

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The First View

Hippolytus went to Athens for a celebration of the mysteries, where Phaedra saw him and became obsessed with him due to his beauty. In Euripides’ Hippolytus, Phaedra spends days ailed by her predicament, the third female in her family to suffer with her mother who loved a bull and her sister being the bride of Dionysus, she suffers with loving her step-son.

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Hippolytus - son of Theseus and his first wife, an Amazonian queen Antiope (or possibly Hippolyta)

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Phaedra - Daughter of King Minos and Queen Pasiphae of Crete (yes, that Crete - with the Minotaur), sister to Adriane, who assisted Theseus with the labyrinth of the Minotaur. She was the second wife of Theseus, and gave him two sons, Acamas and Demophon.

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Theseus - the king of Athens, most well known for his conquest of the Minotaur although his victories were many including the boar of Cromyon, and the Cretan Bull. (Find the list in Ov. Met. 7.404) He also politically united Attica under Athens. He was later killed on foreign soil after he was exiled following a rival faction overpowered him. His bones were returned to Athens following their repentance.